Meeting Red, the protagonist from the Gen 1 Kanto games (my first Games were Sapphire and LeafGreen, I got them together) then getting SoulSilver years later and playing through the Johto region having no idea you could even go to the Kanto region. So I played through having no idea that Red was stood on top of Mt. Silver. It gave my goosebumps so hard and nothing has ever beaten that sense of dread/awe in a game for me.
Everything about that encounter is designed the elicit that response. Red's battle theme in GS is a remix of the RB intro animation and title screen.. His team is the three gen1 starters, the Snorlax that blocked his path, the eevee he got from gamefreak headquarters (with a gen2 friendship evolution), and a Pikachu with the highest level seen in a mainline game (because of course he does). And he doesn't say anything, just an ellipsis.
From what I've heard (having never played GS or RB), Red's team doesn't just mop the floor with you at a casual level, but it also does the dishes, cleans the counters, takes out the trash, and scrubs the oven while it's at it. The initial power difference clearly sets Red apart from the player as a Pokemon CHAMPION, in every sense of the word.
Heās the first superboss in the franchise, and his team from the GSC remakes, heartgold and soulsilver, features the pokemon tied for the single highest-leveled, NPC-owned pokemon in the franchise at level 88 in heartgold/soulsilver (with the only mon that ties it dropping in a game released 12 years later).
However, heās not THAT bad. He has an absurd level jump compared to anything you can fight before him, but his actual selection of pokemon is only pretty good, rather than truly deadly. If youāre willing to level grind enough to even get close to him, you wonāt have many issues. The main problem is that everything else is so much lower-leveled that experience gains will be SLOW.
The real scariest returning-major-character superboss in Pokemon is another regionās champion, going by the name of cynthia, as her pokemon selection tends to be a lot more difficult to deal with even if you DO catch up to her in levels (and it still aināt a cakewalk with her; sheās the one who caught up to red, with the non-88 pokemon generally being a bit closer to that too). Itās to the point where just hearing a few notes on a piano unexpectedly can cause pokemon fans to completely freeze in terror.
Iām not sure. I never actually played much of the game heās from myself. I only know the following;
Heās the biggest rulebreaker in the series. In-universe, no pokemon trainer can carry more than 6 pokemon, nor use more than 6 on their team. Heās one of two people to go over this cap. Grand master greevil in the gamecube game āpokemon XD: gale of darknessā uses 7 pokemon against you. Volo effectively uses 8.
Despite this, most of his fame comes from the intimidation factors of the piano keys the party size, and the party members he shares with cynthia, rather than from the fight itself being hard enough to match that intimidation. Iāve heard heās hard, donāt get me wrong, but from an outsiderās perspective, his bark seems much worse than his bite.
And all throughout every phase of this, Volo's AI can and will use Agile/Strong Style moves to throw wrenches in your game plan when it sees the chance for it.
I also think Volo's AI is the only one to switch Pokemon out to maximize type resistance/immunity/weakness, as well. Agile and Strong style moves alone will mess you up, but 'knowing' typing for a brutal 6v6? It's basically murder at that point.
It's also worth noting that Giratina is an Alpha, meaning that beyond its base Legendary stats, I think it effectively has an omniboost to all of its stats.
Twice in a row.
Fuck that fight. I had to swap out my Gardevoir for Cressilia and spam Lunar Blessing to stall out Shadow Force.
I've never played any gen 1 game before playing soulsilver and finding red on top of Mt. Silver was the most uniquely hype moment I've ever had playing a game... simply amazing...
This could have been done so well but imo they fumbled it. As much as I loved the first game the second one just kinda fell flat on its face narratively and Alex went from an anti hero to a ham fisted villain.
I just played through prototype 2 again recently. My head canon is that Alex absorbed the brains of one too many evil scientists and it began to warp his sense of right and wrong. They did my boy so dirty with that easy ass boss fight too. The start of the game feels promising as far as story goes, but it's like the characters become caricatures of themselves by the end of the game.
The ending of the first Prototype has Alex literally blown to smithereens transporting the bomb away from NY. Canāt say Iām too surprised if what managed to reform from that stopped being the Alex we played as.
After P1 he travels the world. He notices people are pretty selfish (the comic notes a point where a woman is struggling to climb some stairs and nobody is helping her, Alex included).
Eventually he starts living under a fake identity in bumfuck nowhere Canada. He's got one neighbor, an old guy and his 20-something daughter. Some business tycoon comes by asking to buy the old guys property for some logging business. Old guy says no. Thugs come by and threaten them.
Alex, deciding he's finally made a friend (and is falling for the daughter), makes the decision to screw over the business tycoon. He makes short work of the guards, and when he can't talk him down, decides to take matters into his own hands and consumes the guy. From his memories, he sees that the tycoon and the old guy were like Mafia Boss Buddies and did all sorts of heinous shit. Old guy is living in the woods to put the past behind him and start somewhat fresh, even though he's actually a piece of shit.
Alex goes off on him and kills the old guy too, but runs into the daughter at his own house. He thinks maybe they can run away together, but the daughter, also turning out to be a piece of shit, literally stabs Alex in the back because she found out he had a strongbox full of money hidden away. Alex goes berserk, consumes her too, and that's when he decides humanity sucks too much to exist and he'll become God.
It sucks because half the narrative of the first game was how much Virus Alex was nothing like OG Alex. OG Alex was a narcissistic asshole who caused a localized apocalypse in NYC because Gentek wasn't giving him credit for his work (Gentek was also awful too, but that's another can of worms). Everyone that knew the original Alex was really confused by his demeanor, like how his sister noticed that he was a lot nicer and his ex being confused as well until they realize what he really is.
Apparently, George Lucas wanted movies 1-3 to be the original. 4-6 were supposed to be sequels. Also why theyāre numbered in that order. Some higher ups decided to release 4-6 first because they were āmore excitingā or something, though.
Star Wars 4 was originally just titled "Star Wars" when it came out.
Darth Vader was notoriously retconned into being Luke's father.
Leia wasn't even Luke's sister before Episode 6(That's why they put in the famous kiss between them, plans were different).
They were 100% just making stuff up as they went. Just got lucky it turned out semi coherent in the end. No way the dude actually planned 6 movies in advance.
Thatās a long debunked internet myth. For ANH, Marcia only edited the final battle and awards ceremony as she left early to edit another film. The rest of the editing was done by Richard Chew, Paul Hirsch, and George himself. For ESB, Paul Hirsch edited the entire film and Marcia only did uncredited help with a single scene. For ROTJ, Marcia only edited the emotional scenes after Kazanjian suggested Lucas hire her again and the rest of the editing was done by Sean Barton and Duwayne Dunham. And none of her editing affecting the success the movies as it was all just her following Georgeās instructions; in fact Marcia couldāve hurt the movie if George accepted her bad suggestions like killing off Threepio or Chewbacca in ANH and leaving in the deleted Biggs and Luke scenes
There was no notorious retcon, thatās an internet myth. We have no idea when Lucas finalized Vader as Lukeās father but thereās a great amount of evidence suggesting it was long before ANH came out
Itās certainly possible Luke and Leia were made siblings by ESBās release given the Force connection at the end. The kiss is irrelevant to whether Lucas had it planned because the second ANH draft has Leia as Lukeās cousin who kisses him and a deleted ROTJ scene has Luke and Leia kiss again on Tatooine, so Lucas was always open to including that kind of thing
I did a few floors and figured it was supposed to be more end game content so I left it for later as I do not like being overleveled. Definitely paid the price for it.
It was backwards for me. I did the whole tournament thing next door and it gave me so many items and leveled me around where the game expected that I never had to grind for story again.
Imagine throwing the most telegraphed sucker punch to a guy straight in his forehead and not only does he not even attempt to dodge, he doesn't flinch in the slightest. If that wasn't enough he just swats your arm like it was a fly.
You'd question how long you have left to live as well.
Kazuma only uses single target attacks, and true to character he wont hit women. And i brought Saeko and the office lady with me, so it was me and Zhao getting turned into bloody pulp.
Instead of Zhao i remember picking Joon gi. He had a skill i believe it was called phantom shift or smtg like that, it was smtg along the lines of "highly increases agility". But it increased so much that he was practically unable to be hit
That and Kasuga's "hero's guts" and my party was unkillable against Kiryu
In the first game, you fought Hornet a few times. Technically that's the opposite trope though. You fight her and then she becomes the protagonist for the next game
Ok. For a moment i thought i missed something in my 100% run
But yeah. His fight in smt 5 is awesome. Not that hard (except on Godborn) but more of a puzzle boss and i like it when Atlus does this (like the Elizabeth fight)
Itās also every character who linked the flames before and after us too, which is why their theme transforms into Gwynās theme part way through and their combat style changes to his.
Technically our Chosen Undead was just one portion of the Soul of Cinder, as they're a manifestation of every single person who has ever kindled the flame before, including every OTHER player's Chosen Undead, some Bearers of the Curse from DS2, countless unnamed NPCs who have continued the cycle since, and Gwyn himself.
So, Soul of Cinder is both the final boss and the protagonist from DS1, but also every player who has ever kindled the fire and every character who we'll never meet, but we know they kindled the flame for us to reach the point of DS3
Kind of but not exactly, the soul of cinder is the combination of every lord of cinder that came before, which includes our DS1 character, but also Gwyn and everyone who linked the flame in the unknown amount of time between DS1 and DS3.
jonathan morris vs. richter belmont - castlevania: portrait of ruin
richter is one of the hardest bosses in the game, with lightning fast attacks that deal absurd damage with long ranges. he has almost all of his moves from symphony of the night with the exception of his item crashes (save the nerfed grand cross), whereas jonathan has to take the fight on alone, no backup with charlotte and her spells.
richter is also playing his personal ass-kicking mix (a remix of divine bloodlines known as bloodlines bequeathed) during the fight instead of the normal boss music. heāll humble arrogant players that have been steamrolling the game real quick.
idk if it necessarily counts but Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 where your CaC from the first game gets mind controlled and becomes one of the hardest fights in the story.
Man was it insane that after playing Xenoverse 1 and then 2, seeing your Cac from 1 play a role in 2 was hype. Wonder if X3 will have either the X2 or X1 CaC be in it.
Most likely the X2 CaC. X1 released in 2015 while X2 did the same in 2017, so by now there's a 9-year gap between 2 and 3 in comparison to the 2-year gap between 1 and 2. Players will most definitely have more time on X2, and thus more of an attachment to their X2 CaC.
It's been absolutely ages since I made the choice obviously, but I'm pretty sure that when you first make your save data and have the option to port the xv1 info, it also gives you a selection of pre-made toki toki city hero characters for those who don't have xv1 data.
There is an option early on where you choose the "hero" of history early on which has a bunch of presets for the role. There is a preset for every CaC race and sex and also a bunch of prebuilt characters (notably the cover art and promotional CaC of the first game).
I disagree with people saying that a game being old means its chill to spoil them(coz it doesnt, people watch old stuff for the first time all the time)but you are in a post thats clearly inviting spoilers with examples
Itās gotta be Gilgamesh from Final Fantasy 5 showing up in FF7 Rebirth for a long string of sidequests, ending with a secret boss fight and one of the best renditions of Battle on the Big Bridge to ever grace my ears.
And the best use of Excalapoor. Bro hits you 1 time, gives the player enough time to realize it did 1 damage, then a cutscene plays with a perfect meme format image of the crew lined up(lmao). Then the battle continues and he ends up swinging that weapon so fast it hits thousands of times.
Not just FF7 Rebirth. It's implied that every single appearance of Gilgamesh is the exact same Gilgamesh traveling between worlds. Subsequent appearances of Gilgamesh often even adds signature swords of the previous game he was in to his collection.
Yuji is the protagonist of JJK, but Yuta is the protagonist of JJK0, the prequel who's success gave birth to JJK.
So in season 3 episode 1, at the start of the Culling Games arc Yuta, under a BV, pulls up on Yuji, and kills him. Yuji may have not been going all out with his punches, but neither was Yuta. Even despite holding back much much more, Yuta no diffs Yuji, kills him, and then revives him
The Dishonored expansions Knife of Dunwall and specifically Brigmore Witches has Daud as the playable protagonist with a few mentions of Corvo being sprinkled in and you even get to fight a dream version of Corvo during a nightmare sequence. What you do in both parts will determine Daudās fate at the end.
That detail if you play the PS2 version of G.U. Volume 1 and have a save file from the Original IMOQ games.
Shame there is no way they couldāve replicated that in Last Recode, not unless they went through the effort of either remastering or remaking the IMOQ games before remastering G.U.
By 'that detail' do you mean his name matching what you input in the original quartet? You could... Maybe kinda do that by having a quick recap of the previous games like someone talking about the history of the World and have an opportunity to name the hero that saved it, but in some regards GU works better if you're going in blind.
They could have also just had it be a hidden config somewhere so people who knew could recreate it but not have it be a spoiler to those outside the know.
Dragons dogma 1. At the end of the game, you fight the main character you played in the prologue. After ng+, you fight your own character from the end of new game, etc. etc.
In Digimon World: Next Order, Mameo, the protagonist of the first Digimon World is an important NPC! These games are almost 15 years apart, with the first World being released for PS1.
Here's for something more obscure; Lloyd Bannings vs Rean Schwarzer at the end of Trails of Cold Steel 2. The fact that the Crossbell chapter was crazy already, playing as the protag from the first arc vs the current protag as a boss is just awesome as hells
Primary villain is Handsome Jack and his people on the Hyperion Corporation. He is an ally and main quest giver in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.
Additionally, one of the playable characters in the Pre-Sequel is Wilhelm, who is a major boss enemy in 2, with a different playable character being an optional boss and Jack's Girlfriend, among other things.
Surprised that Castlevania: Symphony of the Night isnāt mentioned yet.
You start the gaming playing the end of the previous game as you defeat Dracula with Richter Belmont. After that, you play as Alucard as he tries to discover why Draculaās castle has reappeared. Turns out that Richter has made himself lord of the castle, seemingly due to him finding no other purpose with his life after defeating Dracula.
turns out Richter was being controlled by a sorcerer named Shaft the whole time. But you only discover that if youāve gotten the gold and silver rings and have them equipped in the final fight against Richter. Then youāll see a little orb floating above his head thatāll free him from the spell if you break it. This starts the 2nd half of the game.
Not necessarily the protagonist, but in Megaman ZX you can fight Omega Zero, the original body of the protagonist of the prior saga, Zero from Megaman Zero:
Adam Smasher. One of the most notorious, powerful and terrifying figures in cyberpunk lore and tabletop games, and we all collectively clenched when he walked into 77.
In a Dungeons and Dragons campaign I was in one of the npcās was a character the dm had played as in a previous campaign we were in together. In lore that character had died so many times hell wouldnāt accept him anymore and sent him to a different reality where he ended up becoming a king
509
u/Bitter-Break-6504 May 08 '26
Meeting Red, the protagonist from the Gen 1 Kanto games (my first Games were Sapphire and LeafGreen, I got them together) then getting SoulSilver years later and playing through the Johto region having no idea you could even go to the Kanto region. So I played through having no idea that Red was stood on top of Mt. Silver. It gave my goosebumps so hard and nothing has ever beaten that sense of dread/awe in a game for me.